Remedy's Control Resonant scores 84 with critics, six days before it goes on sale. It swaps the heroine for her brother, and the gun for close fighting.

The rest of the day

10 more stories on this beat.

Each with its own sources. None of these is a link to the story above.

1. 02

   Wolverine outsells Sony's other 2026 games

   Marvel's Wolverine, Sony's new superhero game on PlayStation 5, has sold about 1.9 million copies and made about $130 million, by the estimate of the research firm Alinea Analytics. [13] That is more than any other game Sony's own studios released this year. Marathon sold 1.8 million, MLB The Show 26 sold 1.5 million, Marvel Tokon sold 740,000 and Saros sold 510,000. [13] Wolverine averages 77 with critics, which Polygon calls one of the lowest scores for a Sony-made game in years. [13]

   2020 financial year58.4 million copies

   2024 financial year28.9 million copies

   Why it matters — Alinea's Rhys Elliot says the character's popularity carried it, especially in the US, where 53% of its players are. [13] Sony's own games sold 58.4 million copies in its 2020 financial year and 28.9 million in 2024, about half as many. [13]

2. 03

   A court fines an AI copy of Genshin's voices

   A court in Shanghai ordered a company to stop selling AI-made voice packs that copied 63 characters from Genshin Impact, and to pay miHoYo about $112,000. [14] miHoYo is the Chinese company that makes Genshin Impact. [14] The seller had also used pictures and story clips from the game in its adverts. [14] The ruling came on 30 June, the company dropped its appeal, and a Chinese news site reported it last week. [14]

   Why it matters — It is Shanghai's first case of its kind, and it treats copying a game's voices with AI as unfair competition against the game's maker. [14] It does not settle the separate question of whether AI tools may be trained on game voices. [14]

3. 04

   Nex raises $150 million for its family console

   Nex, the company behind Nex Playground, a small family console played by moving around, with no controller, raised more than $150 million. [15][16] The round was led by the investors Baillie Gifford and BAI Capital, and the bank JPMorgan added a credit line. [15] Families pay a quarterly or yearly subscription for more than 60 games, including Bluey, Sonic and Pac-Man. [16] Its active subscribers grew sevenfold in 18 months and are close to one million. [15]

   Why it matters — Nex says the money pays for stock, shipping and sales in new countries: Germany later this year, then Japan and Korea in 2027. [15] It also made Jeff Shouger, a former Niantic, Zynga and EA executive, its finance chief. [15][16]

4. 05

   Dredge's maker funds a new studio

   Black Salt Games, the New Zealand studio behind the fishing horror game Dredge, has set up a new three-person studio called Team Trifold. [17] It also started Saltworks Entertainment, which handles marketing, testing, translation, sound and publishing for three small studios in one Christchurch building. [17] Black Salt pays for Team Trifold's first game, Nothing Lost, out of Dredge's earnings. [17] New Zealand's government also returns part of what studios spend on development. [17]

   Why it matters — Studios on that rebate grew their combined revenue 17% to $829 million. [17] Black Salt's producer Nadia Thorne says sharing staff lets each studio stay small instead of growing past what it needs. [17]

5. 06

   Lollipop Chainsaw returns without its creators

   A sequel to Lollipop Chainsaw, a game from more than 14 years ago about a cheerleader who fights zombies with a chainsaw, was playable at the Tokyo Game Show this week. [18] Lollipop Chainsaw 2: Back2Back comes to PlayStation 5 in 2027. [18] It is made by Nada Holdings, Dragami Games, which made the 2024 remaster, and JP Games, led by the former Final Fantasy 15 director Hajime Tabata. [18]

   Why it matters — The original writer and artist are back, but the film director James Gunn and the designer Goichi Suda do not appear to be involved. [18] Polygon found the demo had no voice acting at all. [18]

6. 07

   Solo Leveling gets a game about its gap

   Netmarble, a South Korean game company, showed a demo of Solo Leveling: Karma at the Tokyo Game Show. [19] Solo Leveling began as a Korean web novel by an author called Chugong, then became a comic read hundreds of millions of times and an anime. [19] The game tells the 27-year war its hero fights off-page in the original story. [19] It comes to PC, iPhone and Android in 2026, with no date yet. [19]

   Why it matters — Netmarble says Chugong read and commented on every character and every line of dialogue. [19] So the author keeps a say over a game another company is building. [19]

7. 08

   Capcom retunes Monster Hunter's hardest fights

   Takuro Hiraoka, director of Ascendance, the coming expansion to Monster Hunter Wilds, told PC Gamer that Capcom is changing how hard its endgame is. [20] Capcom set the base game's difficulty so that newer players would not be driven away. [20] Hiraoka says many players of the earlier Monster Hunter: World quit before the story ended because it got too hard too fast. [20] He says Wilds players then got better than Capcom expected. [20]

   Why it matters — Hiraoka says a player who cannot finish a game they paid for is unlikely ever to come back. [20] So Capcom is trying to keep new players through the story while giving experts harder fights after it. [20]

8. 09

   A real voice mistaken for AI

   A player reviewed Luminary on Steam after 24 minutes and called its only voiced character an awful AI voice. [21] It was Mikell, the wife of the game's creative director Keith Kolod, acting for the first time. [21] Luminary is a small action game in early access, meaning paid but unfinished, since 11 August. [21] It has about 350 Steam reviews, mostly positive. [21]

   Why it matters — Keith Kolod says his game lives or dies by its Steam review score, and the studio has no funding and no publisher. [21] One wrong guess about AI now lands on a real person's work. [21]

9. 10

   World of Warcraft's oldest map gets new light

   The test version of World of Warcraft: Forever, Blizzard's new take on its 21-year-old online game, is now open. [22] Players who paid $30 for its new Skyborne elves can play part of it. [22] One mode keeps the old world, models and textures, but adds modern lighting and water. [22] Players are filling forums with screenshots of sunsets. [22]

   Why it matters — Blizzard is selling its old world again, changing the light and water instead of redrawing the whole game. [22] Kotaku reports that the lighting, not the new elves or quests, is what players are talking about. [22]

10. 11

    A report says Game Pass may stop day-one games

    Microsoft's Game Pass is a subscription that gives players a library of games, and until now it included some new games on the day they launch. [23] Polygon points to a new report that Xbox could remove those day-one releases entirely next year. [23] Microsoft has already put monthly time limits on cloud gaming, which streams games over the internet. [23] For now big games keep arriving: Ninja Gaiden 4 joined on 17 September and Gears of War: E-Day joins on 6 October. [23]

    Why it matters — If it happens, big new Xbox games would no longer arrive in the subscription on the day they launch. [23] It is a report, not an announcement, and the article carries no statement from Microsoft. [23]